Experimental investigation on heat transfer behavior of the novel ternary eutectic PCM embedded with MWCNT for thermal energy storage systems

Journal of Thermal Analysis and Calorimetry - In this paper, the variation of thermophysical properties such as the thermal conductivity, thermal energy storage capacity, viscosity, and phase...     

Zinc polyoxometalate on activated carbon: an efficient catalyst for selective oxidation of alcohols with hydrogen peroxide

[PW₁₁ZnO₃₉]^5? was immobilized on activated carbon and characterized using Fourier transform infrared, X‐ray diffraction, Brunauer–Emmett–Teller and elemental analysis techniques. Effective oxidation of various alcohols with hydrogen peroxide was performed in the presence of this catalyst. Easy separation of the catalyst from the reaction mixture, cheapness, high activity and selectivity, stability as well as retained activity in subsequent catalytic cycles make this supported catalyst suitable for small‐scale synthesis. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Triphilic pentablock copolymers with perfluoroalkyl segment in central position

Adding perfluoroalkyl (PF) segments to amphiphilic copolymers yields triphilic copolymers with new application profiles. Usually, PF segments are attached as terminal blocks via Cu(I) catalyzed azide-alkyne cycloaddition (CuAAC). The purpose of the current study is to design new triphilic architectures with a PF segment in central position. The PF segment bearing bifunctional atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP) initiator is employed for the fabrication of triphilic poly(propylene oxide)-b-poly(glycerol monomethacrylate)-b-PF-b-poly(glycerol monomethacrylate)-b-poly(propylene oxide) PPO-b-PGMA-b-PF-b-PGMA-b-PPO pentablock copolymers by a combined ATRP and CuAAC reaction approach. Differential scanning calorimetry indicates the PF-initiator to undergo a solid–solid phase transition at 63°C before the final crystal melting at 95°C. This is further corroborated by polarized optical microscopy and X-ray diffraction studies. The PF-initiator could successfully polymerize solketal methacrylate (SMA) under typical ATRP conditions producing well-defined Br-PSMA-b-PF-b-PSMA-Br triblock copolymers that are then converted into PPO-b-PSMA-b-PF-b-PSMA-b-PPO pentablock copolymer via CuAAC reaction. Subsequently, acid hydrolysis of the PSMA blocks afforded water soluble well-defined triphilic pentablock copolymers PPO-b-PGMA-b-PF-b-PGMA-b-PPO with fluorophilic central segment, hydrophilic middle blocks, and lipophilic outer blocks. The triphilic block copolymers could self-assemble, depending upon the preparatory protocol, into spherical and filament-like phase-separated nanostructures as revealed by transmission electron microscopy.     

Designing spirobifullerene core based three-dimensional cross shape acceptor materials with promising photovoltaic properties for high-efficiency organic solar cells

The development of organic electron acceptor materials is one of the key factors for realizing high-performance organic solar cells (OSCs). Nonfullerene electron acceptors, compared to traditional fullerene acceptor materials, have gained much impetus owing to their better optoelectronic tunabilities and lower cost, as well as higher stability. Therefore, 5 three-dimensional (3D) cross-shaped acceptor materials having a spirobifullerene core flanked with 2,1,3-benzothiadiazole are designed from a recently synthesized highly efficient acceptor molecule SF(BR) ₄ and are investigated in detail with regard to their use as acceptor molecules in OSCs. The density functional theory (DFT) and time-dependent DFT (TDDFT) calculations have been performed for the estimation of frontier molecular orbital (FMO) analysis, density of states analysis, reorganization energies of electron and hole, dipole moment, open-circuit voltage, photo-physical characteristics, and transition density matrix analysis. In addition, the structure-property relationship is studied, and the influence of end-capped acceptor modifications on photovoltaic, photo-physical, and electronic properties of newly selected molecules ( H1-H5 ) is calculated and compared with reference ( R ) acceptor molecule SF(BR) ₄ . The structural tailoring at terminals was found to effectively tune the FMO band gap, energy levels, absorption spectra, open-circuit voltage, reorganization energy, and binding energy value in selected molecules H1 to H5 . The 3D cross-shaped molecules H1 to H5 suppress the intermolecular aggregation in PTB7-Th blend, which leads to high efficiency of acceptor material H1 to H5 in OSCs. Consequently, better optoelectronic properties are achieved from designed molecules H1 to H5 . It is proposed that the conceptualized molecules are superior than highly efficient spirobifullerene core-based SF(BR) ₄ acceptor molecules and, thus, are recommended to experiments for future developments of highly efficient solar cells.     

Structure and morphology of laser-ablated WO3 thin films

The structure and surface morphology of WO₃ thin films deposited by a laser-ablation technique have been found to be strongly dependent on the deposition conditions and the nature of the substrate. By precisely controlling the substrate temperature and the oxygen partial pressure, amorphous, polycrystalline, nano-crystalline and iso-epitaxial WO₃ thin films were successfully grown. The structure and surface morphological features of the films from X-ray diffraction and atomic force microscopy data are described in relation to the deposition conditions. PACS 81.15.Fg; 68.55.-a; 68.37.Ps     

Dielectric and conduction mechanism studies of PVA-orthophosphoric acid polymer electrolyte

Polyvinyl alcohol (PVA)-based proton conducting polymer electrolytes have been prepared by the solution cast technique. The conductivity is observed to increase from 10⁻⁹ to 10⁻⁴ S cm⁻¹ as a result of orthophosphoric acid (H₃PO₄) addition. The plot of conductivity vs temperature shows that a phase transition occurred at 343 K in the sample PVA-33 wt% H₃PO₄. The β-relaxation peak is observed at 313 K. The glass transition temperature of PVA-33 wt% H₃PO₄ is 343 K. Orthophosphoric acid seems to play a dual role, i.e., as a proton source and as a plasticizer. The ac conductivity σ _ac = Aω ^s was also calculated in the temperature range from 303 to 353 K. The conduction mechanism was inferred by plotting the graph of s vs T from which the conduction mechanism for sample PVA-17 wt% H₃PO₄ was inferred to occur by way of the overlapping large polaron tunneling (OLPT) model and the conduction mechanism for the sample PVA-33 wt% H₃PO₄ by way of the correlated barrier height (CBH) model.     

Excitation of plant growth in dormant temperature by steady magnetic field

Experimental results of applying a steady magnetic field (20 and 30 mT) on agricultural plants reveal that their growth is more than that of control plants. Considering that these plants have ferritin cells, and each ferritin cell has 4500 Fe atoms, it is obvious that they have an outstanding role in the plants’ growth. As the last spin magnetic moment (SMM) of the Fe atom posed to an external magnetic field (EMF), the composition of SMM and EMF create an oscillator in the system. Then we have a moment of force on ferritin cells. This oscillator exerts its energy, then damps and finally locates in the field direction. The relaxed energy increased the internal temperature (i.e., the effective temperature of the magnetic spin system of plant) so that it is situated in a proper temperature for growing. This phenomenon (temperature increasing) occurs in the initial minutes of applying the magnetic field. So it depends on the number of times of locating the plant in magnetic field in a day (n). If this number (n) passes the critical value, the plant reaches a burning temperature and growth is perturbed. In this paper, the plant growth rate and critical temperature in a steady magnetic field were investigated and formulated theoretically. An innovative result in this research is as follows: if a plant's environment was in the dormant temperature, we could increase the internal temperature of the plant by applying a magnetic field n times in a day (for growth).     

Rank of quantized universal enveloping algebras and modular functions

We compute an intrinsic rank invariant for quasitriangular Hopf algebras in the case of general quantum groupsU _q (g). As a function ofq the rank has remarkable number theoretic properties connected with modular covariance and Galois theory. A number of examples are treated in detail, including rank (U _q (su(3))) and rank (U _q (e ₈)). We briefly indicate a physical interpretation as relating Chern-Simons theory with the theory of a quantum particle confined to an alcove ofg.     

Rapid and efficient synthesis of 2-imidazolines and bis-imidazolines under ultrasonic irradiation

Rapid and efficient preparation of 2-imidazolines and bis-imidazolines by reaction of ethylenediamine with nitriles in the presence of catalytic amounts of sulfur under ultrasonic irradiation is reported. The advantages of this system are short reaction times, high yields and the ability to carry out large scale reactions.